And in the End My Friend, We Will All Be Together Again

Monday, May 19th

Today was our last day of classes!! It was really exciting to be done, although kind of sad because we’ll be leaving China soon. It was another day of just classes, which can be nice sometimes. This morning was our last Chinese lesson, where we mostly just went over what we’d learned, and learned a few more new things. I’ll still never be even CLOSE to fluent, and I don’t think I’ll be taking Chinese at Pitt, either. I really admire anyone who can major in Chinese, because it’s so hard! Our second lecture was a wrap up of Chinese history and culture, as well. We talked about the Cultural Revolution, and all of the happenings of recent years, including the Tiananman Square Riots. It was really cool to hear about things we learn about in school from the view of someone who was actually affected by these events, being as she was a professor and the rioters were mostly college students. It was an experience unlike any I’ll get from back home, and I really appreciated learning from her.

Tuesday, May 20th

Our last day in China! We had a tour of Lenovo first thing this morning, which was really interesting. Lenovo makes computers and computer parts, a lot of which we use in the States. We got to walk through the plant where all of the computers were being assembled, tested, reworked, everything. There was a whole room of people just watching movies, playing video games, typing documents, anything people will actually need to use the computer for, in order to test the quality of the equipment. I would definitely like to have that job. We also got to play with some of the computers in the showroom, although Katie and I had a decent amount of trouble finding solitaire because the computer is set to Chinese.  I liked the computer that had the Torino Olympics design on it, and Vivien and I played with one of the notebook computers that you can actually flip around and write on the screen like paper. It was pretty bizarre, but really cool.

 

For lunch, we went to a restaurant that only serves duck. They serve you every PART of the duck, however, including the head, and the parts they DON’T serve you, they make into duck soup broth. It was actually surprisingly good, and duck was definitely one of my favorite foods we had on the trip, but it was a mildly bizarre place. They brought out the head of the duck on a plate, and they boys enjoyed making it talk to us, because none of us wanted to suck out the brains, like you’re supposed to, apparently. My favorite part was fried duck fat, which they brought out with a little tray of large sugar crystals. You dipped the fat in the crystals and ate it while it was steaming hot, and it was so good. I think I ate half the plate, until I dropped a piece in my teacup and couldn’t get hold of a waitress for about ten minutes to get a new cup. That was a low point of the meal.

 

After lunch, we went to the Summer Palace. Built for one of the queens’ birthdays, it’s monstrous, and absolutely gorgeous. The painting and the architecture is just awesome, and it feels like it goes on for miles. The only bad part was that the air was so yucky from pollution that my pictures look like my camera had a filter over the lens. The air was BRIGHT YELLOW, which was really, really gross. We walked around the lake first, and through the walkways, looking at all the amazing painting on the buildings, and finally into the palace itself. We walked up and up and up, because the palace is built into a cliffside, so the back exit of each building was high than the front entrance. There was yet again what seemed like millions of steps, but the view of the lake, or what we could see of it through the haze, was really pretty. There were boats on the lake to ferry people across who didn’t feel like walking around, and it was just really pretty. We were able to walk most of the way up the cliff, all the way up to a circular temple where there was a huge statue that looked Hindi, where a lady was worshipping. It was really cool, to see that it’s still used as a temple in modern times.

 

Tonight, we had a farewell dinner with the heads of the program at Tsinghua. It was much like the welcome dinner, and the food was very good. It was nice to have a chance to thank our guides and the program heads for all the work they did to help us enjoy our stay in China. Now I'm just packing and finishing up everything because we have a full day planned for tomorrow! Brunch at Lush, packing, airport, flight home, connection in Newark, and finally home to Pittsburgh!! Josh, Katie, Alex and I had our last Chinese tea party tonight. I'm really going to miss being with all of these kids 24/7, and knowing they're just a floor or a room phone call away. We're all spread out next year at Pitt, but I think we'll probably get together a lot and talk about how much we loved and hated our trip to China. The plane ride tomorrow afternoon should be fun! Less than 24 hours until I'm home!

The Little Engine(er) That Could/It's 5 O'Clock Somewhere..

I never got the chance to post the last few entries for my blog, so here they are. Sorry for the delay! Our last weekend was wonderful, just fun stuff, and a good way to unwind after the busy week and a half we'd had thus far.

Saturday, May 17th

This morning we cancelled class to take a trip to Fragrant Hill. Inaptly named, Fragrant Hill is, in fact, a MOUNTAIN. We were dropped off at the bottom of the “hill” and had to walk up a decent portion of it before we got to the entrance to the actual hill, passing all these shops that were, of course, catering to the tourists. Once we got to the entrance, a group of the girls split off with Prof. Gao to begin our hike. The first half of the hike wasn’t too bad; it was mostly ramped walkways. The stones were uneven and slippery because it was misting, but not terrible. We were excited because we were GOING to make it all the way to the top! Once we hit the second half of the trail, though, we started to reconsider – it was entirely steps, and not nice steps. Steps like the Great Wall, that were varying height and depth, and not easy to walk up all at once. There were very few breaks, and it was EALLY tiring. Such a good calf workout. About halfway up the steps, Prof. Gao decided to turn around and go back, but the rest of us kept going. Finally, after what seemed like six million steps (it was actually 1168 – there was a marking on the top stair), we got to the top!! The view was amazing; we could vaguely make out a few towns and other mountains, although it was really foggy (of course), but the coolest part was the mountain that was attached to Fragrant Hill. There were temples and paths all over it, and you could see everything since it was so close. It was definitely worth the hike. The cable car wasn’t working, so we had to hike the entire way back down, too, which made my calves sore for about two days afterwards, with stepping down sideways for over 1100 steps! At the bottom, we found out that the boys, Jenna, and Laura didn’t even make it to the top. They got roughly halfway up and quit to go shopping for swords. I think we won that one.

 

After lunch back at the University, some of us piled into taxis and went to the Beijing Zoo! It was weird seeing animals in the zoo that just walk around the States. They had raccoons (“raccoon dogs”), porcupines, wolves, etc. They also had the more exotic (at least to me) animals there, too, like lions, leopards, white tigers, and panda bears!! The pandas (“xhong mao” in Chinese) were so cute. I asked Viven if she could send me a panda once I get back to the States, and she agreed. Excellent. :) After the zoo, Rachel showed us a place to get bubble tea, which was really nice after the hot muggy day.

 

Later that evening, we went to Old Beijing. The oldest part of the city, it has all these crazy streets, shops, and bars, and rickshaws! A bunch of us took a rickshaw tour of the area, which was really cool. The drivers took us through the houses and alleys and we got to see where they were restoring bits of the history of Beijing. The best part was Opium Street, the oldest street in Beijing at over 800 years old! It’s called Opium Street because it’s shaped like the stem of an opium pipe, meaning it twists and turns all over the place! The shops along Opium Street were the coolest ones I’ve seen, and we had a really good time exploring them. We also played Chinese hackysack with a bunch of people around the little square, and most of us ended up buying one. I can’t wait to show my little brother! 

Sunday, May 18th

Today was our free day of the trip. We were given the whole day to shop, sightsee, explore, whatever we wanted! Since it was Kayla’s birthday today, a big group of us did birthday things all day! First we went out to a huge brunch at our favorite restaurant, Lush. They have absolutely the best French toast I’ve ever tasted that’s not homemade, and the pancakes were phenomenal as well. Alex and Josh and I all got the same meal, and I finished mine first, so I made the boys man up and finish theirs. After brunch, the girls went to get massages while the boys went back to campus and played basketball. It was weird, because I’ve never gotten a professional massage before, but it was nice after hiking all morning the day before. We then went to the Silk Market, where they have all sorts of counterfeit merchandise. Jenna, Laura, and I found that speaking Spanish to the shopladies helped because they know enough English to help their trade, but they know absolutely no Spanish, so if you rambled off any random phrase, they’d just look at you like you were nuts and leave you alone. It worked pretty well until we got to one of the stalls, where the lady was so persistant, she followed Jenna into the bathroom! Crazy, but we eventually bargained enough with them so get the prices we wanted, although we had to speak in nothing but Spanish for 45 minutes, and I quit taking Spanish in eleventh grade. It was rough.

 

For dinner, we all went out to Old Beijing again and found this really nice restaurant where we could eat outside next to the lake. Josh ordered duck, but was very surprised when they only brought him the duck’s NECK. It was kind of gross, actually. The rest of the food was phenomenal, especially my pumpkin soup. The Chinese ladies couldn't figure out how to work my camera to take a group picture for us, but eventualy they found the button, and it ended up being one of my favorite pictures so far!  Old Beijing is amazing at night, and we had a lot of fun just exploring without having to worry about meeting anyone at the correct time or place. Josh did have to rescue me from a scary drunk Asian man who tried to attack me, but that was the only slightly bad note of a fantastic birthday dinner for Kayla, and a good free day!